BNP's $8.9 Billion Fine All Started With A Father's Investigation Into A Terrorist Bombing And A Persian Rug Shop

By now, everyone's heard that BNP Paribas has agreed to pay an
$8.9 billion dollar penalty to state and federal authorities. But
there's much more to the story.

Yesterday, the
New York Times reported the incredible story of how the BNP
investigation is connected to a bus bombing in the Gaza Strip
perpetrated by a terrorist group two decades ago.

One of the people killed in that bus bombing happened to be the
daughter of Stephen Flatow, a New Jersey resident. Seeking
justice in the name of his slain daughter, he accused Iran of
funding the terrorist group responsible for the incident.

Although
Flatow was awarded $250 million in damages by a federal judge,
Iran never paid. Consequently, Flatow "sought to collect from the
Alavi Foundation, the charity that he claimed was a front for the
Iranian government".

Flatow's accusations generated some interest at the district
attorney's office — partially because one of the analysts working
there was a former Israeli soldier "who happened to have
responded to the scene of that very same bus bombing". As a
result, the prosecutors personally went to investigate a Fifth
Avenue building connected with the Alavi Foundation that "was
built in the late 1970s by a non-profit tied to the Shah of
Iran". Unfortunately, nothing out of the ordinary was found.

For a bit, it seemed that the investigation hit a dead end. But
all of a sudden, everything changed when the prosecutors visited
a Persian rug shop.

The shop owner, who had ties to Iran, revealed that the Alavi
Foundation was entirely under Iran's control.

According to the New York Times article:

The evidence against the Alavi Foundation was extensive, former
prosecutors say [... and led to] a settlement agreement that
forced the Alavi Foundation to forfeit its holdings in the office
tower. When the government sells the building, the proceeds will
flow to the families and estates of victims of terrorism.

With the Alavi Foundation case off its plate, the district
attorney’s office turned its focus to Credit Suisse and Lloyds.
The prosecutors offered the banks a choice: turn over records
related to Iranian banks or face a criminal case.

The banks chose to cooperate, producing reams of records
that laid bare a scheme to disguise how Bank Melli was funneling
money into the United States. To avoid detection, the records
showed, Credit Suisse and Lloyds falsified money-transfer
paperwork, replacing Bank Melli’s name with their own.

Eventually,
other foreign banks were also examined. And, on Monday, the BNP
case announced "traces to these deals". Additionally, BNP was
also "doing business with Sudan at a time that the nation was
operating a genocidal regime".